Alert level increased – Saudi Arabia shared intelligence information with the United States and warned of an “imminent” attack by Iran on targets in the kingdom and the Middle East, including Erbil, the Kurdistan capital of Iraq. Corresponding “Wall Street Journal‘ citing Saudi and US officials as saying Riyadh, Washington and other countries have raised the alert level of their armed forces in response to the warning. However, no further details were given.
For the Saudi services in Tehran’s sights there are targets in the kingdom and in Erbil, which was already the target of Iranian drone and ballistic missile attacks at the end of September. One of them was intercepted and shot down by a US fighter plane before it could hit US troops stationed in the Iraqi metropolitan area. “We are concerned about the bigger picture and remain in constant contact with the Saudis through military and intelligence channels,” said a spokesman for the US National Security Council, stressing that the United States “will not hesitate to defend our interests and act as partners.” in the region”.
Attack to divert attention from internal manifestations – Where confirmed, planned attacks would aim to divert attention away from it Demonstrations that Iran has been experiencing for weeks and which countries like the US and Saudi Arabia would be responsible for, Tehran said. The White House National Security Council expressed concern over the warnings and said it was ready to respond “in defense of interests and partners in the region.” Iran immediately accused the US, some European states, Israel and Saudi Arabia of being behind the protests against Mahsa Amini, which began after the girl’s death on September 16 following her arrest. because she wasn’t wearing the veil properly.
And last month in Riyadh, the commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, General Hossein Salami, issued an ultimatum over his media coverage of the demonstrations, accusing the kingdom of interfering in Iran’s internal affairs. But the latest warning comes at a time when tensions between Iran, Saudi Arabia and the United States have escalated amid Tehran’s increasingly explicit Russian involvement in the war in Ukraine.
Iran is also accused of arming Russia – The United States and Great Britain have again accused the Tehran regime of continuing to arm Putin’s Russia. The new threat would be the alleged supply of short-range ballistic missiles. The United States has not yet been able to confirm this possibility, but remains “concerned”. “We remain concerned about the possible delivery of surface-to-surface missiles to Russia from Iran. We don’t have confirmation yet, but we are concerned about it,” said White House National Security Council Strategic Communications Coordinator John Kirby. . Iranian ballistic missiles could be deployed on Ukraine’s northern border. Kyiv Air Force spokesman Yuri Ignat said so, adding that Ukrainian forces would not be able to defend themselves. “We will use all means to protect against these missiles. They will probably be delivered to the north of Ukraine, from where they can threaten the whole country,” he said, speaking of missiles with “300 km” and “700 km” ranges . And warning: “We have no effective defense. Theoretically it is possible to shoot them down, but in reality it is very difficult to do it with the means at our disposal. We have air defense, not missile defense,” he explained, estimating that Russia requested missiles for Iran “because its Iskanders are running out of supplies.”